Have you given your kids fantasy names?

[Ambrus]

Worse, IMO, are the idiot parents who give their kids a common name with a random spelling.

I myself have a similar problem. When trying to choose her offspring's names my mom , who is a french-canadian, wanted a french name that both french and english speakers would be able to pronounce properly. Unfortunately it didn't occur to her that english speakers have their own pronunciation for my name. My name is Denis, which in french sounds like "Duh-nee". English speakers see my name written down and naturally pronounce it as the familiar english "Den-iss" which makes my mom furious.

She insists that people should be familiar enough with the name to know how to pronounce it properly (i.e. in french). I've tried explaining it to her over the years that people don't usually see familiar names and try pronouncing them in random foreign languages but she just can't accept it. I personally don't really care either way.

Oddly perhaps my middle name, Marc, would have achieved her goal handily if she'd chosen it instead.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Any child of mine would never be on a 'schoolyard' in the first place, so that doesn't concern me.

I certainly wouldn't hesitate to use a made-up name or that of an existing character; on the flip side, most 'fantasy names' sound dumb to ME. I wouldn't want to saddle a child with a name that sounded stupid in his native tongue, but nor would I want to append a common one.

No kids yet, though.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Heh, Marc would have worked great for that.

And I think Apple was Gwenyth Paltrow's kid.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Any child of mine would never be on a 'schoolyard' in the first place, so that doesn't concern me.

Even if home schooling is practical -- and I think you need to be saddled with the expenses of being a parent before knowing that -- the "school yard" is shorthand for "any interactions with the outside world whatsoever." Unless your intention is to keep the kid in a box their entire life, a goofy name will have ramifications.

 

[lukelightning]

Nevermind. I've mentioned a few 'joke' names like Moxy Crimefighter, Audio Science and Kalel Cage. Didn't some celeb name her daughter Apple?

Celebrities are one thing. If Gwyneth Paltrow wants to name her baby Apple, that's fine. It's not like that will adversely affect her child's educational and employment opportunities that much. But when regular folks like you and me do it, there could be severe consequences; I've seen articles on black families' use of stereotypically "black" names (Latisha, etc.) and how that becomes yet another obstacle in these kids' lives.

And a whole 'nother issue is: If you're going to go with a non-standard name for your child, why rely on someone else's made-up name? Why not just make up your own?

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Even if home schooling is practical -- and I think you need to be saddled with the expenses of being a parent before knowing that -- the "school yard" is shorthand for "any interactions with the outside world whatsoever." Unless your intention is to keep the kid in a box their entire life, a goofy name will have ramifications.

Having been homeschooled, I can say that at least in my case it carried essentially no expenses. Not quite sure what you mean by that.

As to the rest, I agree - but define 'goofy.' Plenty of 'real names' come across as goofy because they're out of fashion, some foreign names sound goofy (or worse, like bad puns) in a different country, and a lot of fantasy names are goofy by default. Made-up names, or simply uncommon ones, are no more goofy by default. What makes them thus is word association, phoenetics, recognizability, etc.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Having been homeschooled, I can say that at least in my case it carried essentially no expenses. Not quite sure what you mean by that.

It's more expensive today to raise a kid than it was when anyone posting here was growing up. Many parents feel they both need to work just to provide a minimum standard of living. (Not luxuries like vacations and new cars, but clothes, a roof, food and utilities.)

 

[Henry]

If you're going to name a male child a gimmicky name, pick something that is hard to argue with, like "Wulf" or "Steel" or "Gunn."

A friend named his daughter with the middle name "Nerys" after the Deep Space Nine character. Other than that, I don't know of too many names from fantasy or pop culture among friends. I've seen plenty of whacked names in the school programs my wife has worked -- cigarette brands, cleaning products, rap stars, etc.

 

[lukelightning]

I'm surprised nobody has brought up the (totally fictional) urban legend of that girl named, well, it starts with an Sh and ends in head... or the one of the girl named "Female" or the one named "Syphilis."

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

It's more expensive today to raise a kid than it was when anyone posting here was growing up. Many parents feel they both need to work just to provide a minimum standard of living. (Not luxuries like vacations and new cars, but clothes, a roof, food and utilities.)

Can't really answer that without violating the CoC, except to say that homeschooling has somehow managed to be on a steady uptick during the time period we're talking about (well, that *I'm* talking about - the '90s and '00s as opposed to the '70s and '80s), and dual-income families have been in decline for, IIRC, about a decade. More and more people apparently feel exactly the opposite.